How confident are you now that Mac Jones is “the guy”? 1-10

[Bill Lee]

Mike Reiss on Mac:

 

[venecol]

When a guy is completing almost 70% of his passes with a solid YPC, you can dismiss many of his incompletions as intentional to avoid a sack or INT. He rarely misses a target if there's a good lane to throw in, whether it's a flare, screen, 10-yd cross, 20-yd out, or 50-yd post. He has fantastic touch on short passes, terrific accuracy on deep throws.

He'll never be one of the top-5 laser throwers like Herbert showed the other night. But how does that matter if he excels at every other type of throw? And there's also a direct correlation with lasers and dropped passes - Mac's passes are very easy to catch.

He was completing 70% of his passes and was #1 for a stretch. He ended at 67.6 (#8), still pretty good.

He's not very accurate on deep passes (+15 yds). This is thru week 17: 35%/32%/46% accuracy to left/middle/right.



Passes that are easy to catch are also easy to INT. Makes me nervous when I see him throwing those floaters.

 

[patsfan13]

He was completing 70% of his passes and was #1 for a stretch. He ended at 67.6 (#8), still pretty good.

He's not very accurate on deep passes (+15 yds). This is thru week 17: 35%/32%/46% accuracy to left/middle/right.

View attachment 39853

Passes that are easy to catch are also easy to INT. Makes me nervous when I see him throwing those floaters.

I would like to see how that compares to Elite deep throwers. I would assume that the ability to the Receiver to get separation downfield would affect the %.

 

[DropKickFlutie]

He was completing 70% of his passes and was #1 for a stretch. He ended at 67.6 (#8), still pretty good.

He's not very accurate on deep passes (+15 yds). This is thru week 17: 35%/32%/46% accuracy to left/middle/right.

View attachment 39853

Passes that are easy to catch are also easy to INT. Makes me nervous when I see him throwing those floaters.

But look at how deep passes are only a fraction of the total. And also curious how it compared to other QBs, hitting on less than half may not be too bad and just a couple balls difference. The way BB plays, it's more important to get accurate medium and short throws and keep the chains moving....

 

[Rob0729]

A good analysis of Jones by Kurt Warner here. Spoiler: Kurt really likes the guy and is high on him. But he does have some criticism of his game too.

 

[holyredeemer]

80 mil in offseason for pass catchers, most ever spent in the BB era.

Career Avg’s of those pass catchers before they came to New England.

Henry- 49 rec-5 TD’s-580 YDs
Agholor- 45 rec-4 TD’s-569 YDs
Bourne- 34 rec-3 TD’s-442 YDs
Smith- 29 rec-4 TD’s-325 YDs

Look at that killer group!!

Agholor and Smith have been an absolute waste so far. I was expecting more out of Henry, but he drastically improved our TE grp, and was clutch in the RZ and on some key downs. Bourne has been lights out for the deal he was given.

Mac IS a rookie. His receiving core IS middle of the road, and all in their first year. Let’s not act like $$$ spent=big talent. Mac is gonna need improvement from the current grp, and at least one playmaker added that has a knack for the YAC and stretching the field.

 

[*ChungFu*]

Until someone with all of Mac's attributes AND a cannon shows up, Mac is the guy.

 

[yukon cornelius]

Career Avg’s of those pass catchers before they came to New England.

Henry- 49 rec-5 TD’s-580 YDs
Agholor- 45 rec-4 TD’s-569 YDs
Bourne- 34 rec-3 TD’s-442 YDs
Smith- 29 rec-4 TD’s-325 YDs

Look at that killer group!!

Agholor and Smith have been an absolute waste so far. I was expecting more out of Henry, but he drastically improved our TE grp, and was clutch in the RZ and on some key downs. Bourne has been lights out for the deal he was given.

Mac IS a rookie. His receiving core IS middle of the road, and all in their first year. Let’s not act like $$$ spent=big talent. Mac is gonna need improvement from the current grp, and at least one playmaker added that has a knack for the YAC and stretching the field.

the difference when agholor is in the lineup vs out of the lineup is noticeable.......he's not a take over the game guy, but he fills a role on this offense

henry and bourne have been as advertised (bourne better, but that's what i expected)

i wonder how much of smith's "struggles" have been to coming to a new system, one that isn't easy to pick up.......and how much of it is due to the pats going run heavy, by design, vs a more wide open 2-TE set......a lot of their 2-TE sets have used Owenhu as the 2nd TE......as they open things up more as Mac matures, and given a full off season in the system, I expect we'll see more out of Jonnu down the road


looking at how things shook out this year, it's really hard to judge pass catchers in this offense

 

[venecol]

Good honest assessment from Warner. That's also what I've observed from the very begining, he seems to be risk averse. I thought it was the play calling that tried to keep him in check until McD said they weren't holding anything back in the playbook. His receiving core may have something to do with it, but we've seen guys that are open downfield getting ignored for a check down. Hopefully, he opens it up during the playoffs.

 

[stinkypete]

Define "the guy".

Are we talking a perennial top 5 QB who elevates middling rosters to annual short list Super Bowl contention? Not sure there's any reason to have confidence that this happens in any QB until he actually does it.

Or are we talking about a hard working, above average QB who can be relied on to lead a good team into the playoffs for a decade? I'm close to a 10 on this one.

 

[DropKickFlutie]

Career Avg’s of those pass catchers before they came to New England.

Henry- 49 rec-5 TD’s-580 YDs
Agholor- 45 rec-4 TD’s-569 YDs
Bourne- 34 rec-3 TD’s-442 YDs
Smith- 29 rec-4 TD’s-325 YDs

Look at that killer group!!

Agholor and Smith have been an absolute waste so far. I was expecting more out of Henry, but he drastically improved our TE grp, and was clutch in the RZ and on some key downs. Bourne has been lights out for the deal he was given.

Mac IS a rookie. His receiving core IS middle of the road, and all in their first year. Let’s not act like $$$ spent=big talent. Mac is gonna need improvement from the current grp, and at least one playmaker added that has a knack for the YAC and stretching the field.

But why use this metric including every pass catcher's typically low rookie year.

Henry's production is below his last SD year, Jonnu's production is below his last 2 Titans years, why set the bar intentionally low. There are a dozen examples of the oc not maximizing the talent on this team. Jonnu had 0 targets last game and 1 target 2 games ago. Not even trying to get a 2nd TE involved.

.

 

[holyredeemer]

the difference when agholor is in the lineup vs out of the lineup is noticeable.......he's not a take over the game guy, but he fills a role on this offense

henry and bourne have been as advertised (bourne better, but that's what i expected)

i wonder how much of smith's "struggles" have been to coming to a new system, one that isn't easy to pick up.......and how much of it is due to the pats going run heavy, by design, vs a more wide open 2-TE set......a lot of their 2-TE sets have used Owenhu as the 2nd TE......as they open things up more as Mac matures, and given a full off season in the system, I expect we'll see more out of Jonnu down the road


looking at how things shook out this year, it's really hard to judge pass catchers in this offense

I’m actually more impressed with Bourne and Henry’s results vs what I expected. I was excited by Henry, but expected him to miss some time to injuries. He has stayed healthy, and become a great tragedy for Mac. I thought Bourne would do well in the system, but more as a move the chains kinda guy. I didn’t expect some of the big plays we’ve gotten from him. I agree about Agholor and Smith. Expect much bigger things from both of them next season. Especially Smith, if he really puts in the work this offseason. Agholor has definitely not been worth the price tag though.

I wasn’t trying to judge the receivers. It is there first year after all, and with a rookie qb. The post I was referring to appeared to try and make it sound like Bill went out and surrounded Mac with all this talent. They’ve delivered just about what their career numbers said they would. I’m hopeful that all of them can grow with Mac, but we definitely need a playmaker that teams have to account for to open the field up for him a bit.

 

[yukon cornelius]

I’m actually more impressed with Bourne and Henry’s results vs what I expected. I was excited by Henry, but expected him to miss some time to injuries. He has stayed healthy, and become a great tragedy for Mac. I thought Bourne would do well in the system, but more as a move the chains kinda guy. I didn’t expect some of the big plays we’ve gotten from him. I agree about Agholor and Smith. Expect much bigger things from both of them next season. Especially Smith, if he really puts in the work this offseason. Agholor has definitely not been worth the price tag though.

I wasn’t trying to judge the receivers. It is there first year after all, and with a rookie qb. The post I was referring to appeared to try and make it sound like Bill went out and surrounded Mac with all this talent. They’ve delivered just about what their career numbers said they would. I’m hopeful that all of them can grow with Mac, but we definitely need a playmaker that teams have to account for to open the field up for him a bit.

gotcha

 

[brdmaverick]

I'm unfair when it comes to this rating. There is nothing that he can do this year that will convince me he is the guy. Hell, I wasn't even convinced Brady was 'the guy' when he won Super Bowl 36. Yes, I know in hindsight that looks rather dumb, but yes I'll admit I was STILL in the Bledsoe camp.

I would have to see a sample size of two years to really make an assessment, but since you are asking me right now.

I'll say I really wanted a quarterback with some great physical skills ('arm talent' is the buzz phrase). I figured it would be great to have a guy with arm strenght who can zip the ball downfield even from awkward or unbalanced positions. I figure start with phyiscal attributes and try to develop the smarts. Here we went the opposite and went with smarts and I've bene pleasantly surprised. I know he's been down lately but in general he's done a lot and with a pretty lackluster receiving corp.

Is there any team in the playoffs with worse offensive skill players than the Patriots right now? That's got to account for something.

 

[patsfan13]

We need a slot receiver either a FA or a draft pick maybe both. Renfrow or Berrios would help as FA Covey from Utah in the draft.

 

[DropKickFlutie]

We need a slot receiver either a FA or a draft pick maybe both. Renfrow or Berrios would help as FA Covey from Utah in the draft.

Brady isn't here, the slot option route WR was for him. Would it make sense to bring it back for a different QB? Charlie Weiss had some good complementary football going on without needing a stud player to bail them out.

 

[StrawHatPatriot]

Did I say that? I am just saying that they averaged the same amount of yards per pass. You would think that if arm strength meant that much to passing down the field, Herbert would have significantly more yards per pass. I am not talking about quality of the player themselves.

Is that air yards? Or just regular yards?

Either way, this is the issue with stats.

I don't know if Mac can do what Herbert did in that Raiders game.

 

[holyredeemer]

Is that air yards? Or just regular yards?

Either way, this is the issue with stats.

I don't know if Mac can do what Herbert did in that Raiders game.

*Pats v LAC*
Mac went 18/35-217yds and 0/0
Justin went 18/35-235 yds and 2/2


How they do it doesn’t matter, as long as they can get it done. Everyone wants to compare Mac to every other QB around the league for some reason, and they all have one thing in common. They’re not rookies. I get what you’re saying, Mac doesn’t have the arm strength that Herbert has. That’s absolutely true. Good thing for us fans, arm strength is just a piece of the puzzle.
Also, Mac already had that type of game this season. It was against the Cowboys.

 

[patsfan13]

Brady isn't here, the slot option route WR was for him. Would it make sense to bring it back for a different QB? Charlie Weiss had some good complementary football going on without needing a stud player to bail them out.

A good slot is important to running this offense most efficiently. With Mac ability to read the D he would thrive with a good Slot.

 

[LightSkinSmurf]

6.5. It's too early for me to go much higher than that. Sample size is too small and it's his first year.